


L-O-V-E

by asexualshepard



Series: Broken Scopes [7]
Category: Fallout (Video Games), Fallout 4
Genre: AKA Ethan gets a lil bit tipsy, Dancing, Drinking, Established Relationship, Excessive Drinking, Fluff, Light Angst, M/M, Mac's hat is dirty, Mild Hurt/Comfort, Reminiscing, Slow Dancing
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-12-27
Updated: 2015-12-27
Packaged: 2018-05-09 20:41:29
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,192
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5554595
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/asexualshepard/pseuds/asexualshepard
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <i>“We shouldn’t be here,” he mumbles as Ethan helps him climb over the desk blocking cracked, shifted stairs. “Feel like I’m gonna be Humpty Dumpty pretty soon.”</i>
</p>
<p>
  <i>MacCready’s foot snags on the edge of the desk, and Ethan laughs as he catches him by his elbow, hauling him to his feet with little distance between them. </i>
</p>
<p>
  <i>“Last floor, string bean.” Ethan’s hand squeezes comfortingly. “Promise.”</i>
</p>
            </blockquote>





	L-O-V-E

**Author's Note:**

> I recommend listening to Nat King Cole's "L-O-V-E" while reading this, but it's in no way necessary. Just a good song that gave me some inspiration. :)

Wandering through cities isn’t MacCready’s favorite thing in the world. Tall buildings aren’t stable—not after two-hundred years of little-to-no maintenance—and he’s always afraid one of them is going to come down on his head. But he puts up with it. You can find some pretty valuable stuff on the higher levels of more precarious edifices, and MacCready’s never been one to turn down caps.

Still, watching Ethan climb onto shaky flooring makes him a little nervous. He calls out tentatively more than once—when his stomach twists as Ethan wanders out of his line of sight—and doesn’t stop talking until Ethan returns. The further up they get, the more MacCready rambles, and the closer Ethan stays. By the time they reach the tenth floor—where the concrete beneath their feet is at an angle and all of the furniture is piled on the lower side of the room—MacCready is ready to get back down.

“We shouldn’t be here,” he mumbles as Ethan helps him climb over the desk blocking cracked, shifted stairs. “Feel like I’m gonna be Humpty Dumpty pretty soon.”

MacCready’s foot snags on the edge of the desk, and Ethan laughs as he catches him by his elbow, hauling him to his feet with little distance between them.

“Last floor, string bean.” Ethan’s hand squeezes comfortingly. “Promise.”

MacCready’s nose scrunches when Ethan reaches up to tug the bill of his hat down over his eyes. His own hand reaches up to adjust it, and, when he can see something other than the dirty inside of his cap, he finds Ethan gone already, heel disappearing through the doorway at the top of the stairs.

“You’re gonna owe me something after this!” he calls as he follows, shifting the weight of his rifle in his hands.

He takes the stairs two at a time, briefly slipping on only one of them, and then he’s stepping into the room. His eyes sweep over the pile of desks at one end, the shelves that have fallen over. Ethan is bent over one of these shelves, his back curled as he bends his legs to compensate for the awkward tilt of the floor.

“Would, ah,” he starts, twisting to look at MacCready with a wide grin on his face. “Would some rum get me off the hook?” His hand rises, a brown bottle pressed to his palm.

“Oh-ho-ho, man!” MacCready’s lips mimic Ethan’s as his rifle drops to hang from one hand and he rushes to stand at Ethan’s side. Before Ethan can react, MacCready has taken the bottle and is smiling down at it. “I haven’t had rum in forever.”

“I’ll take that as a yes, then?”

“Depends on how fast you can get us out of here.”

Ethan laughs—loud and rolling, just the way Mac likes it. “I’ll be quick.”

No matter how many times it happens, a small part of MacCready is still surprised when Ethan rises to press a quick kiss to his lips. It shouldn’t make his stomach jump—for God’s sake, Ethan’s seen him naked—but it does, and, for a moment, he forgets that the building they’re standing in could come down around them.

And then Ethan is wandering to the other side of the room, slinging his shotgun across his back. MacCready watches for a second before quickly shoving the bottle of rum into his pack—discarding several pieces of junk to make room—and eying up all of the possible ways to get in or out of the room. They hadn’t had many problems this time around. A few raiders had been holed up on one of the lower levels, but they’d been taken care of easy enough. With any luck, no others would follow.

“You know,” MacCready says after a few more minutes have passed, “you’re gonna owe me another bottle of rum pretty soon.”

“Just—gimme a sec.” Ethan grunts, and MacCready turns to find him with his arm shoved into the small crevice between two of the piled desks. His other hand is braced against the wood.

“What, ah—” MacCready reaches up to scratch at the back of his neck. “What are ya doing, Boss?”

Ethan grunts again and digs his arm further into the hole. “There’s something at the back.”

MacCready’s brow bows, lips twitch into a smile as he watches Ethan struggle. He’s always so composed and put-together; seeing him scramble a bit is a good time.

“Ha, yes!” Ethan exclaims as his arm slides out of the hole. “Fuckin’—got it.”

MacCready snorts as Ethan’s eyes drop to the object sitting in his open palm and then paces over to see exactly what the thing is.

“A holotape?”

Ethan stands and flips the small, yellow-and-white rectangle in his fingers. “Looks like it,” he says, examining the label closely. “Should we see what’s on it?”

“If we can do it while we get the heck outta here.”

Ethan grins, amused, and curls the fingers of one hand around the holotape while using the other to push MacCready back the way they came. Once they’ve made it back over the desk blocking the stairs, begun to make their way back down building, Ethan busies himself with shoving the holotape into the slot at the back of his Pip-Boy. MacCready leads as they continue their descent. Someone’s gotta make sure Ethan doesn’t fall face-first down a flight of stairs.

“So?” he asks, glancing back over his shoulder. “What is it?”

Ethan’s gloved fingers twist the dial, the clicking of it louder than it normally seems. “Nat King Cole,” he answers with a soft smile.

“Is that, like, a bug or something?”

Ethan snorts. “No, no, it’s—he’s—” He sighs, smiling and shaking his head, at which point MacCready returns his attention to the stairs they’re clambering down. “I’ll show you later.”

“Over rum, right?”

Ethan’s laughter carries through the stairwell, echoing in MacCready’s ears.

“Yeah,” he chuckles, the laughter dying slightly, but the amusement remaining. “Over rum.”

 

* * *

 

“So he just _… sang_? And he made _money_?”

“Mhmm.” Ethan nods, eyes glued to the display of his Pip-Boy—far away. “His stuff used to be a staple in my living room as a kid.”

The bottle is empty, but Ethan’s fingers are still curled around the neck, letting the bottom of it drag against the dirt beneath them, yet he pulls it to his lips anyways. MacCready had taken two sips before passing it to Ethan. Initially, he’d been the one planning to get shit-faced, but Mac knew Ethan, and he knew something wasn’t quite right. Ethan would probably need a lack of sobriety more than he would.

When no liquid hits his tongue, the bottle drops, and Ethan stares at it. “Shit, I drank all your rum.”

MacCready takes the glass from Ethan’s palm and briefly considers throwing it before setting it aside.

“Just find me some bourbon next time and we’ll call it even.”

Ethan smiles sadly, returning his gaze to his Pip-Boy. “Deal.”

For a moment, the only sound that fills the chilled night air is that of the dial clicking as Ethan twists it, as he looks through the longs list of songs stored in the holotape’s memory. MacCready relaxes (though he knows he shouldn’t) and leans back, bracing his hands against the dirt floor of the second level of the tall building they’d scaled. But then music begins to play.

“My parents used to dance to this kind of stuff,” Ethan mutters, fiddling with the volume controls.

“That where you got it from?”

He nods. “I, ah, had to stand on Mom’s feet at first. She said it was better than me steppin’ on her toes all the time.”

The corner of MacCready’s lips tug upward as he imagines Ethan—small enough to not break any of his mother’s bones—balanced precariously on the tops of her feet. Picturing him as small takes a moment, but it comes. And damn, it’s adorable.

It’s a huffed breath of soft laughter that brings MacCready’s attention back to Ethan. “I used to sneak out of bed to watch her and Dad dance. Looking back, I’m pretty sure they always knew I was there, but… y’know. Still got to watch Dad spin her.”

Ethan stares at the display of his Pip-Boy for a long, melancholy moment, and then he smiles. At what, MacCready isn’t sure, but his fingers stop twisting the dial, and the song changes.

 

_L is for the way you look_  
_at me_  
_O is for the only one_  
_I see_

 

“Think I could get you to dance with me?” Ethan asks, his gaze turning to MacCready’s face for the first time since the bottle of rum had been passed between them. His cheeks are slightly flushed, eyes wet, but his smile is what makes Mac’s heart jump into his throat.

“Promise me _two_ bottles of bourbon, and then yeah.”

Ethan grins and gets to his knees before standing, offering a slightly wobbly hand to help MacCready stand. Mac listens to the song as Ethan pulls him close, wrapping one strong arm tightly around his waist. It’s faster than what they normally dance to. But, still, Ethan takes his hand, and then they’re moving. Ethan might be a little drunk—only a little though, because damn, the man can hold his liquor—but his feet are as sure as ever, and the unfamiliar pace of the dance causes MacCready to stumble over his own feet a few times.

Then, lips are pressed to his temple, words filtering into his ears.

“ _Love—is more than just a game for two_ ,” Ethan mutters into MacCready’s skin, not singing, simply speaking the lyrics in time. “ _Two—in love can make it. Take my heart and please don’t break it. Love—was made for me and you_.”

“Reckon you know this one,” MacCready says, arm curling around and behind Ethan’s elbow, the one connected to the hand gripping MacCready’s waist.

He feels Ethan nod against his cheekbone. “It’s the only one I remember.”

And they keep dancing, feet shuffling instead of dragging slowly as they usually do. Shoes tap, hips bob—the movements aren’t jerky, though they definitely would be were Mac to lead, but Ethan somehow manages to make every shift graceful, even as the pace and energy of the music lifts. He hums against MacCready’s temple, and the subtle smile that accompanies the sounds curves against his skin.  Subtlety vanishes the second the music’s volume and tempo takes another kick up, and the smile turns into a grin.

“Ready?” Ethan asks, fingers tightening on MacCready’s waist.

“Ready for wh—Oh, shi—”

MacCready’s ears are filled with Ethan’s booming laughter as he’s suddenly spinning on his heel, his other foot swinging out wildly in an idiotic attempt to maintain his balance. He’s pretty sure he kicks Ethan’s knee, but damn, guy deserves it. Still, he manages to catch MacCready before he falls on his ass, so that’s something.

“Could’ve warned me,” MacCready grumbles against Ethan’s jaw as an arm once more wraps around his waist, holding him close.

Ethan’s lips press to MacCready’s temple briefly. “Wouldn’t have been able to watch you freak out if I’d warned you.”

“Yeah, well,” Mac starts, finding his own grip on Ethan’s shoulder, “now you owe me _three_ bottles of bourbon.”

“Can I make it four?”

“You’re a child.”

“What can I say?” Ethan leans back a bit, eyes finding MacCready’s, grey glinting brightly, grin wide. “You bring that out in me.”

Mac tries to keep his face neutral—he really does—but damn, that smile is infectious, and the corners of his lips quirk upwards in response. His tongue pokes out to lick at his bottom lip as he turns his head in an attempt to stop himself from grinning like an idiot. It doesn’t work, of course.

“Thanks for humoring me, by the way,” Ethan says through his smile as he leans forward to knock the tip of his nose against MacCready’s cheekbone. “And for letting me drink your rum.”

MacCready’s head turns back towards Ethan, the bill of his cap bumping against Ethan’s forehead before readjusting itself, sliding further back on his head. Noses brush, and the corners of Ethan’s eyes crinkle with his grin, irises themselves bright. Whatever melancholy had been present earlier is long gone.

“No problem, Boss,” MacCready says, fingers squeezing on Ethan’s shoulder.

Eyes soften, foreheads lean on one another. MacCready’s stomach still jumps when Ethan kisses him, slow and soft and saying words but not out loud. Fingers tighten on his waist, his palm. He’s pretty sure he feels his hat slip off his head and fall against his ankles, but he doesn’t care. Damn thing was dirty anyways.

“Think I could get you to do one more song?” Ethan mumbles against his lips, eyes closed, a smile building around his teeth.

“Promise to help me drink those three bottles of bourbon first and I think we can come to some sort of arrangement.”  

Ethan kisses him again, another song starts, and MacCready’s hat—his stupid, dirty, always-in-his-eyes hat—stays on the floor for another hour.

**Author's Note:**

> I just needed to write yesterday, and all of the WIPs I had going were smutty, but I really wasn't in a smutty mood. Hence, dancing fluff--because I can't get enough of Ethan dancing, apparently.


End file.
